


Give me a (new) life

by momopichu



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Happy Ending, M/M, Mentions of other overwatch cast, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, PTSD, Post-Recall, Reaper76 Week 2019
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-02-19
Updated: 2019-02-24
Packaged: 2019-10-31 13:33:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 6,094
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17850422
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/momopichu/pseuds/momopichu
Summary: Talon's fallen. The world is safe and Overwatch is back, right where it should be. But some old folks have to make a decision: To be a hero, or not to be.





	1. 1: We 'could' be heroes

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this while working and I splurged. Sorry for errors.
> 
> Edit 19/2/19: Took out a paragraph in Chapt1. Felt it should be added a bit later.

**We Could Be Heroes**

“So, what do you say – Commander?”

Jack stares at the outstretched hand.

            Winston watches him watch his hand with all the patience of a handler approaching a spooked animal. He doesn’t move, doesn’t fidget. It’s almost too much like the Suit that said to him ‘Say yes and thank you, Mr. Morrison’ nearly forty years ago. And wasn’t it the same? Here he stands at another crossroads. The kinds that were lifechanging and would take him down the path leading to the unknown. Except this time…

            This time, Jack knows what’s going to happen. His mind rattles like an old recorder, it casts him back. Back to the Suit.

 

And he sees his pale stricken hand – scarred and callused from the war – take hers. Give it a hearty, solid shake and his voice. God, his voice. Gravelled and rough from screaming in the war, say ‘ _Yes, thank you_ ’. Click forward to years later, and he’s leaning against his desk with his arms folded in front of him, wondering, wondering, wondering.

_‘At the end of the day, Overwatch was the only way to win the war. But we had to be given a chance.’_

_‘You still have one sir.’_

            A chance. And where had that led him? A front row seat where he watched a generation of young sign themselves to endless war. Had his friends shot and his body, mind – _heart_ – shredded. Been thrown away and buried under rubble while a base burned. A life running on the streets and hope far away – always on the horizon, never close, not even enough to touch.

He used to have a grandma – died in a car crash, typical – that liked to rave. She would tilt her head in that owlish way and stare him straight in the eye, and she’d say _‘Jack-oh-Jack my young, sweet, boy. Never trust a chance y’hear me. Never trust a chance.’_ And like the young, naïve, boy he was back then, he would ask ‘ _why not grama?’_ And she would say – in that old, sagely voice of hers – _‘Because Jack-oh-Jack. Chances are carpets over trap doors. They shine, of course they do, but every snake shines too my Jack-oh-Jack. Every snake shines too – all the better to draw you in, and all the better to bite you deep._ ’

He hated her laugh. All teeth and spittle. He was glad when she died.

 

Jack takes a step back, shakes his head.

            And watches as Winston watches him with wide eyes.

            “But Jack –”

            “No, I’ve been in this too long. It’s time for me to leave.”

            “But the world,” Winston says, “It _needs_ more heroes!”

            “It _could_ use more heroes,” Jack corrected “But it’s not going to find one in me. Not anymore.”

            He says the last as a sigh. Winston doesn’t understand. How could he? He’s only seen the best of what Overwatch had to offer the world. He hasn’t seen the dirt that the organisation sat on; hasn’t seen how the soil was watered with the blood of those that carried its weight on their backs. Jack knows, his blood is down there somewhere too. He doesn’t regret giving it, actually. His only regret, was that he could never again believe in the cause they had fought for. But that was why they had the young and hopeful.

            “Thank you, Winston. But I’m done.”

            With one last pat on his old friend’s shoulder, Jack Morrison, sometimes known as the vigilante Soldier: 76, leaves.

 

The alleyway is empty but for the roaches that scuttle away at his sudden entry. Cold radiates off the sodden brick that line the way, dark and welcoming after the glaring streetlights that stand on the pavement edge.

            Jack knows his way from memory, having often visited this place many times in his days as a vigilante. He finds the stack of cardboards he had used last time mostly untouched – but for the additional boards that someone had dumped since. He smiles under his mask and settles on the makeshift bed, feeling them crunch under his weight. His duffel bag gets tossed beside him, Pulse Rifle safely deposited within.

It’s a little wet, the smell of mould strong even through the filters of his mask. But this was calming, familiar. More so than the soft beds and warm food. More so even than the friendly glances ‘heroes’ throw his way, the talk – the _noise_.

            A dumpster on one end and a dead end on the other protects him from prying eyes. In here, he was safe. Closed off from the rest of the world with just the coat around his shoulders and his mind for company. All that was missing was just—

            “Meow!”

            “Hello Charlie,” Jack says.

            The cat that trots up to him is white with orange striped patches. She meows again, unfazed by the stench that must clings to the alley like a haze. She’s gotten herself a bloody patch under her nose since he last saw her and her tail hangs in the air like an upside-down J, end flipping left then right, and twines around Jack’s the moment she is close enough to stretch and paw at his shoulder.

            “Meeow!” She says again, louder, insistent.

            “Alright, alright.” Jack groans. From within a pocket of his duffel bag, he retrieves a tin of cat food and pulls off the lid for the demanding feline.

            “I thought being a stray taught you how to hunt.” Jack grumbles, setting the tin down.

            Charlie does not reply – already whiskers deep in her food.

            “Fine then, ignore me.”

            Jack proceeds to retrieve another tin for himself. It’s a little thicker than Charlie’s, taller even. And stolen, from that Korean MEKA pilot’s stash of foods right before he left Overwatch. Cup-ramen, cooked with just a crack of the heating pad on the lid – praise modern technology.

            The lid makes a solid ‘ _tok_ ’ as it comes alive to cook his food, just enough that it catches the attention of Charlie that had – annoyingly – pushed all her food to the side of the tin and was looking for more chow.

            “Mreow?”

            “No,” Jack says.

            She squeaks a protest when Jack tries to shove her muzzle away from the hot lid.

            “You have _your_ food, this is mine!” Jack snapped. “You’re a grown cat now, act like it!”

            But Charlie would not stop.

            In the end, Jack despairingly parts with a piece of shrimp for some peace and quiet.

 

He was scrolling through his phone when the smoke appeared.

            Jack had been checking safehouse locations. Trying to find the ones where he could nab some supplies from before moving on – maybe towards the East. Just rob a bike, deposit Charlie – who was currently sleeping on his jacket – in a carrier and just…go.

            But right now, it seems he would have to put his planning on hold. He put away his phone and looks up at the form that coalesced from the black fog. It seeped from every corner of the alleyway, sliding over the grimy floor to shape itself, first as a blobby teardrop, before taking on the form and features of Gabriel Reyes, clad only in a black turtleneck, long coat, and trousers. His Blackwatch medallion hung from a belt at his side, polished to a mirror-like finish.

            “Thought you’d be in L.A. by now,” Jack said by way of greeting.

            Gabriel narrows his deep brown eyes, glance flickering over to the cardboard the Soldier sat on and the cat hogging the jacket at his side. Jack doesn’t comment on the little red speckles he saw within, finding them almost mesmerising in the low light. He wonders if it changed Gabriel’s vision somehow, made him see better or something.

            “You stink,” Gabriel replied.

            “This whole place smells. And you didn’t answer my question.”

            “Always demanding answers aren’t you, Jackie? Thought you were past that.”

            Jack could snap back, but really, what was the point? Like Gabriel said, he was supposed to be past that – past prying into Gabriel’s business like it mattered. Jack looks away, glad he had the foresight to put his mask and visor back on after his meal.

            “Look, if you have nothing nice to say can you just…leave?” Jack said, “I know it doesn’t look like much, but this is kind of my bedroom.”

            A full minute passes in silence. In that time, Jack keeps his gaze locked on the far wall that was the dead end of the alley. Someone had graffitied their signature on it, he could make out the letter A with an elongated stroke that merged it with one side of a bird’s wing and an ‘o’.

            He hears a sigh and shuffling. But looking back, Jack finds Gabriel only scratching the back of his neck. The former mercenary looks a little lost, but that could just be that he was a little too dressed up for being in an alley. Jack huffs and tries to lie down on his cardboard bed. Charlie and her jacket-bed were in his way. So, he opted for lying on his side so as not to disturb the cat.

            “What are you doing?”

            Jack twisted his head so that he could see Gabriel in the corner of his vision.

            “Going to sleep,” Jack replied.

            “You’re not sleeping here, Jack.”

            “Watch me.” And he promptly closes his eyes. Something insistently shaking his shoulder stopped him from getting any sleep though.

            “What do you want?” Jack snapped, sitting up and slapping Gabriel’s hand away.

            Gabriel was knelt by his side, his long coat trailing in the soggy dirt. Gingerly, he rubs the hand Jack had slapped. This close, Jack could see the scars that lined his dark features. They were healed, almost gone, an attribute of his condition. He had loved them. When he was allowed to. Jack looks away.

            Firm fingers under his chin turned his gaze back. Back to those deep brown eyes – lined with a dappling of rosy red. Jack can’t look away. He never has from those eyes, pinned like a butterfly under the lamp. He fists his hands in the cardboard.

            “Come with me.”

The words were a shock.

            A bucket of ice-cold water over his head. The recorder of Jack’s mind clicks, clacks, rewinds and plays. Distant booms echo in the back of his ear and thrums in his bones. But the flower that blooms in the air is no flak. It opens in a burst of colour: green, blue, purples. Colours he thought he’d never see again now that his world had been narrowed to nothing but greys and reds. It was meant to mean hope. A new day. The war was over, hurrah.

            The fireworks go on, splashing across the sky like droplets of paint on a watery canvas. He feels his neck creak as he looks over to his partner, his Commander. Gabriel’s got misty eyes. The dash of foggy rain on warm windows. Jack thinks he’s never looked so beautiful, not even the mud could hide the deep chocolate of his skin that glowed under the lights, the firm and tight grasp he keeps over his heart, even as he turns back to Jack. And stretches his hand out.

            ‘ _Come with me_.’ He says.

            Jack jerks back. The hand that is stretched to him now is a little more worn, a little more lined. It glows an eerie moonlight blue in the alley and trembles at the edges. Ethereal, almost. A ghost under water that would disappear the moment he reached for it.

            But when he dropped his forehead into the palm, it did not disappear, did not fade into mist to leave him to fall. It was warm.

            “And where will we go, Gabriel?” He asked.

 

_After all, we’re not heroes anymore._


	2. Keep yourself alive

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bridges are repaired and the pining starts.

**Keep yourself alive**

His head thudded against the wall.

Feeling the pain wasn’t enough to cull the many thoughts and words – endless _noise_ – in his mind, Gabriel thudded his head again. It bounced a little off the wall, like a marble on a hard surface, and then hit the wall again. He groaned.

A meow around his ankles catches his attention though, and Gabriel looks down to find Charlie perched against his thigh.

“Meow.”

“I don’t have any food. Go find Jack.”

“Meow!”

“I don’t speak cat!”

“She means I’m in the shower – or was.” Jack said.

The soldier was soaked. Naked mostly, but for a towel around his waist and framed in the doorway of the bathroom. White hair now silver, clung to his scalp while water dripped in rivulets down his body – little gems of light that swivelled between his muscles and the many scars that weaved a tapestry of tales. Down and down they went, shaping the harsh lines of his hips and along the ‘v’ that partially hid beneath a fluffy towel. Jack tilted his head, blue eyes tracing Gabriel who stood with one hand on the wall he had just been thumping his head on.

“Something I should know?” Jack asked.

“No. Just—” Gabriel sighed, “Can you put some clothes on?”

Jack’s head tilted just that bit more.

“Look your bo…i-it’s so—" Gabriel cut himself off. Jack’s lips had gone between his teeth. He could see the soldier gnawing on the puckered skin. The other man reached back into the bathroom, pulling a second towel out to cover himself. It draped over a webbed wound on his side, tendrils of melted skin that distorted the smooth planes of his stomach.

“It’s not your scars. The scars are fine.” Gabriel held a hand out, as if he could reach and pluck his previous words back into nothingness. “Fuck—just. I mean – How can you be so _blinding_?”

 Jack stilled, the towel clutched to his chest. “Uh…thanks? I guess?

“That came out wrong. I meant to say you looked white – _pale_.”

“Okay.”

“I didn’t mean to come on to you like that.”

“Okay.”

"I just—"

“ _Okay_.”

They stood, facing each other. Jack still had his lip between his teeth – bit to a thin line. And Gabriel didn’t know what to do. What should he say. What _could_ he say. Once upon a life he walked beside this man and a shoulder brush was all he needed. He _knew_ Jack as surely as Jack knew him. Now though, he could see Jack shift, the towel at his chest grasped between flexing fingers. He looked nervous. But that was all Gabriel knew. Jack looked about, away, then back. But never into Gabriel’s eyes, on the wall behind him maybe, or over his head.

“Um…” Jack began. “Do you…”

“What do you need?” Gabriel asked and stood.

Jack flinched. It was small, a bare stiffening of his body, a step back. He looked away again.

“Do you have any spare…clothes?” Jack said, whispered. “I didn’t have a lot…and they probably…smell. Too.”

“Y-yeah, sure. Hang tight.” Gabriel left.

In the corridor of the shadowed apartment, he felt about in the storage closet for the spare clothes he knew he kept in case of events like this. The box he finds them in is dust coated, whittling at the edges. He fumbles around inside it, pulls out a wad of cloth. And pauses.

He’s pulled out sequin, the flattened beads prickly against his palm. They were sewed down in the pattern of a heart on a pink shirt. Fingers trembling, he stretches it out. The shirt was small, not even a third of his size. More sequins in gold spell out the words ‘Little Princess’ under the heart in over-the-top cursive. Gabriel’s butt hits the floor.

 _So, this was where it went_.

He glides his fingers over the beads and rumples the cloth between his fingers. When he brings it to his nose though, there is no smell. Not even a wisp of the scent – or memory. His mind is blank. He can’t remember, can’t even conjure up a speck of those times.

And doesn’t that _hurt_.

The small shirt shrinks between his palms, crumpled to a ball as his features pinch. His head knocks against the door of the closet. And again.

He would’ve kept going. The pain is hardly enough.

But a hand slips in between wood and head, holding him steady. Another hand reaches past him to take the shirt from his hands, smoothing it out on another box. That done, it reaches for his shoulder and turns him around. Jack, still naked with a towel around his waist, sits beside him on the floor.

“You can still go back,” Jack said. He’s looking at the shirt, a far off look in his eyes.

“And what do I say? Sorry for being dead?” Gabriel’s breath came in harsh. Harsher. “Sorry for never being there? _Sorry_ , I was a huge fuck-up of a father?”

Jack’s head dropped. Gabriel could see him examining the lines of his own hand. “I was thinking more of just ‘Hi’,” he said.

“You – still – never think ahead.”

“And you still think too much.”

They glared at each other.

“You don’t have to say…” Jack huffed, “I mean you could just let things play out. See how it goes. Wing it.”

“Improvising has never been my forte, you know that.”

“You improvised pretty well in the Last Fight.”

Gabriel thinks he sees a hint of a smile on Jack’s face, but it could just be a trick of the light.

“Doomfist would’ve killed you if I didn’t.”

“Thank you for that. By the way.” Jack scratched the back of his head. He still wouldn’t look at Gabriel.

Finally, Gabriel gripped the soldier’s chin, and turned his head. Jack’s eyes were ringed with dark shadows and wrinkled at the corners. But the blue core of them, they still shone through – bright as a cerulean sky and twice as clear. Softly, Gabriel ran his thumb over the scar on the soldier’s lip, feeling the smooth hill and the rougher, drier skin of his lips.

“You didn’t use to be afraid of looking at me.”

“You didn’t use to mind my nakedness either,” Jack countered. He was smiling, trying to. There was a question in there, that even Gabriel – with all the time and space between them – could decipher. It was like reading a very old book, written in a language he _used_ to speak. He couldn’t read everything, but he got the gist.

“Yeah because you had a lot more baby fat on you – made you look _cute_.” He said.

“Don’t call me cute!” Jack shoved his hand away.

Gabriel laughed and ruffled his wet hair. Jack plucked Gabriel’s hand from his head, a wide smile dominating his face. When he put Gabriel’s hand down though, he did not let go of the other man’s wrist. Gabriel could feel the slide of Jack’s thumb against his skin, the sensation of circles drawn over the vein – just feeling, testing. Gabriel twisted his hand, enough that he held Jack’s hand. Firm, with no space between. Like two puzzle pieces coming together. They stayed like that in silence, brown eyes tracing blue eyes under a lone lamp in a closet.  Then Jack looked at their hands.

“I’m not afraid of you, Gabriel.” He said.

“Then?”

Jack shook his head. It wasn’t the ‘I can’t tell you’ shake though, Gabriel could read that much. But a different kind, the kind that pinched Jack’s brow and made him think and think. The kind that said, ‘I don’t really know’. And Gabriel understood. He reached up with his other hand to smooth away the wrinkles that dented the soldier’s forehead, hoping the simple act could ease his worries – calm the waters.

For a second it seemed Jack followed his palm, nose drawn to the scent of his skin until he caught himself, looked away. The soldier shivered. Gabriel chewed the inside of his cheek, but let it slide, and turned back to the box of clothes. He ignored the pink shirt lying at the corner of his sight and occupied himself digging through the other clothes until he felt he found one satisfactory.

Gabriel pulled out a dark grey hoodie. It was large, baggy, colour paled from too many washes in the machine and seams spitting cotton strands. It was one of his older ones too, the label at the collar empty and white. He unzipped it in one smooth slide and wrapped it around Jack’s shoulders. The soldier pulled it tight, slipping his arms into the sleeves and rezipping the hoodie. He made no comment on the choice, but ran a hand over the cloth.

It was soft. _He_ was soft.

Gabriel shook himself and tore his eyes away. He pulled out a pair of sweat pants from the box – also grey, also worn – and handed it to Jack.

“These should do until we get your clothes washed, or buy new ones.”

Jack nodded and rose, the pair of sweatpants clutched to his chest. Once up, he reached his free hand down to Gabriel. The ex-mercenary took it, letting Jack pull him to his feet. Together, they turned off the closet light and shut the door. When Jack turned to head back to the bathroom though, Gabriel stopped him with a hand on his back.

“I…” he began.

“Yes?” Jack asked. He twisted. Not completely, but just enough that Gabriel saw the blue of his eyes.

“I…”  Gabriel huffed, fidgeted. “I like you. Alive.”

“Oh…kay?”

“I mean. I couldn’t – when Doomfist—” Gabriel sighed. How had he got here? Got his words all wrong and his mind all muddled – all filled with _noise_. So much noise. Fuck. His memories tumbled. They always do with Jack around. Gabriel’s seen so much – so much of _Jack_. Watched him turn down Overwatch and a chance back at the hero-life. The flabbergasted face of Winston when Jack walked away – Gabriel didn’t know if he should’ve laughed out loud or cry. And then Jack had taken a squat in an alley. Given his coat to a stray cat no more than a kitten and bedded on a nest of boards too soaked to be of use. So dark.

So alone.

 _Tired_.

“When Doomfist was about to…yeah.” Gabriel closed his eyes and dropped his head to rest on the hood of the hoodie Jack wore. “Don’t scare me like that again.”

There is silence. In the hall, in the air. But in Gabriel’s mind the noise grows louder, whines, _screams_. A hand settles on his head and rubs in soothing circles. It cuts through the thoughts like nothing else ever has, burning a swathe of silence through the noise. He lifted his head and found Jack looking back, his blue, blue eyes looking right into his own.

No hesitation this time. Gabriel could see the light in them, the little flecks of green that highlighted the blue just right and made them glow. If he leaned forward a bit he’d see them better, press his nose right up to Jack’s cheek and…

Gabriel stepped back and swallowed. Nodded to Jack.

Jack nodded back and turned, heading back towards the bathroom, but paused a few steps forward, turning to face Gabriel.

“I like you too,” he said. “Alive, that is.”

And disappeared inside.


	3. Under Pressure

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A pair of old men try to make small talk and one of them is afraid.

**Under Pressure**

Jack was adamantly not looking across the table.

Partially because Charlie was being a little menace. No, he took it back. She wasn’t being a little menace, she was being the biggest menace anyone ever had the grace to meet. Despite several attempts at telling her that ‘no, the table was for _humans_ ’, she kept climbing up. Now she was perched on Jack’s lap with her front paws on the table, her nose stretching forward to scent the various plates that were – thankfully – empty.

Jack had one hand on her scruff and the other on the little crest of her chest when Gabriel tapped his shoulder. Jack hadn’t even seen him move, too occupied with preventing the not-a-kitten from tasting something she shouldn’t. The ex-mercenary was holding two bottles of beer. Not the strong stuff, the kind one got at a good pub while they chatted the night away. He quirked a brow at Jack, brown eyes darting between the soldier and the cat.

“Don’t ask,” Jack replied

Gabriel shrugged but obliged, placing the opened bottle near enough that Jack could reach for it if he so wished. That done, he plopped back into his own chair across from him. For a few moments, there was nothing but the sound of Jack and Charlie arguing – the cat _insisting_ on scenting a plate that had contained spicy foods.

“How did you get her?” Gabriel asked at last.

“I thought I said—”

“Face it, Jack. The cat’s winning.”

Jack shot a glare at him. Gabriel was smirking over the lip of his beer bottle. He took a swig, adam’s apple bobbing, casting a shadowed hill that Jack couldn’t help but watch. He shook himself, just in time to pull the cat back from swiping his beer bottle off the table.

“Found her – noo – in a box in that alley – Charlie!” Jack huffed. Getting an arm around her belly, he deposited the noisy cat in his lap and retrieved his beer in the other. But Charlie would not be deterred.

“Meow!” she said and reached for the shiny brown thing in his hand with paws outstretched.

“No!” Jack snapped “You aren’t allowed to become a raging alcoholic.” To Gabriel, he said, “She was abandoned as a kitten. I fed her, kept her warm.”

“Even between missions?”

“If it was just recon, yeah.” He gestured to the opening in his hoodie, right where the zip ended and revealed sharp collar bones and pale skin – tried to ignore the swooping of his gut when Gabriel’s eyes flicked to it. “She was a jacket kitten for a while. Went with me on missions – Ana thought I was crazy.” He chuckled. “But she took care of Charlie when I was in fire fights.”

“Knowing Ana, she complained all through it.” Gabriel hummed.

“She did,” Jack nodded. “But she made Charlie little ear muffs – to keep her safe from the noise. And a pouch too.”

“A pouch?”

“Yeah. Ana’s been practising – knitting, I think.”

“One or two needles?”

“Uh…one.”

“That’s crotchet.” Gabriel took another swig, then waved his bottle in the general direction of Jack. “But…you…”

“What?”

“Charlie wasn’t with either of you in the…the Fight. She was back in the alley…”

“Oh.” Jack brushed a hand down Charlie’s back, from between her ears down to her rump. The cat’s eyes drooped and she purred, the motorboat tremble felt even through his clothes. “We…” he sighed “Ana and I agreed, that taking Charlie to the Fight was…irresponsible.” He felt between the twitching cat ears, rubbing the tiny skull and soothing the fur. “We took her to a vet, had her go through the works. But Charlie…didn’t want to be put up for adoption”

“Oh?” The beer bottle was half way to Gabriel’s lips.

“Yeah. She caused a scene at the vet when we tried to leave her behind.”

“Wouldn’t Ana…you know.” Gabriel made a shooting motion with his free hand. “Dart her?”

“I asked her about that actually, after we left the vet.” Jack said. “She said she didn’t think about it at the time.”

“Huh. That’s not like her.”

“That’s what I said too.” Jack shrugged. “She looked like she was ready to dart _me_ for saying that.”

“Wouldn’t be the first time.”

“Same goes for you,” Jack replied and stood to collect the plates – Charlie lifted to be deposited on his shoulder. The feline chirped at the sudden change but obediently shifted, sinking clawed paws down into the soldier’s skin and hooking her dainty tail about his neck.

He could feel Gabriel’s eyes track him around the table. The beer bottle always held close to his lips but never tipped over to be drunk. Jack tried not to squirm under the gaze, feeling like a child again, trying to impress a teacher. He was almost thankful when he arrived at the sink.

Plopping the dishes in, the soldier pulled the tap. Searing hot water sloshed onto the dishes and into the air. Jack hissed as a few droplets landed onto him, prickling his sensitive skin.

A dark chocolate hand reached past him, adjusting the tap until the water temperature was just right. Jack hadn’t seen Gabriel move. Again.

“In a rush, Jackie?” Gabriel asked.

“Gotta get my kicks from somewhere,” Jack grumbled, rubbing the slight burns “I’m not allowed to get into fights anymore.”

That got a chuckle out of Gabriel. “You could always play competitive paintball.”

Jack thought about it. “Only if you’re on my side.”

He felt Gabriel still behind him. “That’s not fair on the kids.”

“Who said anything about playing fair?”

Gabriel laughed, the sound so full-bellied that Jack couldn’t help a smile to tick up on his own lips. It was good hearing the ex-mercenary happy. Jack wasn’t sure Gabriel would be fine after… after the ‘closet’. But maybe. Just maybe. They could be okay.

He almost jumped out of his skin when a head landed on his shoulder. Gabriel was still laughing, the shudders shaking the soldier and causing his hands to swing with the plate they were holding. Charlie was less happy about the new arrangement and pawed at Gabriel’s head, almost as if saying ‘my human – shoo!’.

Jack couldn’t complain. He wanted this. The heavy, masculine scent of Gabriel close by, the weight of the ex-mercenary on him, around him. And still, he couldn’t bring himself to stare directly into Gabriel’s eyes. Something was off, but he just couldn’t figure out what it was – yet.

Arms folded on his back, settling elbows on his shoulders. Gabriel hooked his chin over the side without a cat.

“Are you okay, Jack? You’re stiff as a board.”

Jack fumbled for something to say. “I was thinking about sleeping arrangements.”

“Oh yeah.”

“You only have one bed,” Jack pointed out. “You can have it.”

“You’re the guest,” Gabriel said in return. “You take it.”

“What—no! This is your place, you take the—” A finger slipped over Jack’s mouth, silencing him.

“Compromise. We _share_ the bed – it’s big enough.”

“What is this—some romance novel?”

“Those are your words, not mine.” Gabriel chuckled. “But, really. We can share, it’ll be like back in basic.”

Jack hesitated. “Gabriel…I really don’t think it’s a good idea.”

“What’s wrong?”

“Nothing’s wrong. I just uh…I get…”

“Nightmares?”

Arms crept around Jack’s waist, linking themselves in front of his belly. Not really a hug. But just… _holding_.

“Yeah.” Jack sighed. “I’ll wake up in the middle of the night and break something.”

For a moment Gabriel was silent. Out of the corner of his eye, Jack could see a slight frown crease the midnight black brows, Gabriel’s lips held in a thoughtful pout.

“I could exhaust you—if you want?” Gabriel asked. “The nightmares can’t hit if you’re tired.”

If Jack was stiff before, he was pretty sure he was now on the verge of cracking with how every nerve and bone jolted.

“…What?” Jack asked.

“What?”

By everything Jack held dear. Gabriel really had no idea.

“You just said—” Jack began.

“What did I just say?”

Gabriel retreated. Jack turned to face him, angled with one hand still in the sink, the other sat on a cocked hip. He then gave the former-mercenary what he hoped was the best you-can’t-be-serious look.

“Oh!” Gabriel exclaimed.

“Uh-huh,” Jack hummed. That took a while.

“I didn’t mean it like _that_ , I was just—I mean I was offering to _spar_!”

“Uh. Huh.”

“I... uh—well…” Gabriel’s lips twitched into a small, hesitant, grin and he cleared his throat. “I’m offering you a good time?”

“ _Gabe_ —”

“But now I’m just feeling attacked.” Gabriel finished.

Jack blinked, then narrowed his eyes. “Isn’t it supposed to be ‘I came here to have a good time and I’m feeling so attacked’?”

“So…does that mean you _want_ a good time?”

Another blink. _Damn_. Jack had fallen for that.

“You know what,” the soldier sighed. “Just attack me.”

Gabriel obliged.

It was a miracle they only broke one plate and pissed off one cat.

           

Jack couldn’t remember what woke him. One moment he was in the blessed abyss of nothing. The next, his mind was running a mile a minute, eyes twitching underneath his lids as they roved to the slightest sounds.

A hand settled on his shoulder and Jack jerked. But before he could get up, the hand clamped down.

“Just me.” Gabriel’s voice was beside his ear, close enough that Jack could feel his breath. “Sorry I woke you. Go back to sleep.”

 Sleep was the last thing on Jack’s mind right now.

So he laid still as Gabriel got up and left the bedroom, the door not quite closing behind him – leaving a moonlit line across the soldier’s supposedly sleeping face. Once Gabriel had gone, Jack got up.

Charlie who had been nestled in the crook of his knees chirped a sleepy greeting but quieted when he soothed her rump, cajoling the feline back to sleep. That done, he crept after Gabriel.

They had slept on the floor. Sheets and pillows thrown about as they both admitted the bed was just too _soft_ after years of foxholes and safehouses. It had been fine, comfortable even. And undisturbed by nightmares thanks to their little tussle in the dining room.

So what had woken Gabriel? The apartment was quiet, disturbed only by the distant gurgle of pipes and occasional zooms of cars on the street.

As silently as he could, Jack walked through the apartment, ears alert and senses prickling. A light was on in the corridor, a miniature sun in the midnight house. He let himself close, perching on the corner out of sight. His ears picked up the rustle of moving boxes, the softer shuffle of cloth as something was lifted.

When Jack finally allowed himself to peek around the corner, he couldn’t explain the sudden painful pangs in his gut. The sensation of threads torn as he watched Gabriel lift that same pink shirt from earlier to his face. Gone was the look from earlier, in its place was something more thoughtful, more distant. Something that squared Gabriel’s jaw and lit a spark in his eye.

And his fingers. They kept running over the silver sequin. Again, and again. A pattern of hearts and circles, on and on like an endless dance.

Jack left.

He returned to the bedroom and replaced himself underneath the covers. Turned his back to Gabriel’s empty side of the floor. And pressed his eyes closed.

Charlie, woken by his entry, padded up to the soldier’s face. There she huddled, protecting his features and giving him something else to bury himself in. He rubbed a hand down her flank in thanks, pressing her close.

 

It comes slow. A realisation that grows like a dream; the mind realising that it has always known, just shut away. To be forgotten. Like many other little things and night terrors. Jack had been the soldier for too long and now he remembers why he feared – why he always felt this fear when he was close to Gabriel.

And why he shut it away. Because it was an irrational fear. One of those fears that was not his to fear.

Jack never feared Gabriel. He feared Gabriel _leaving_.

And wasn’t that _stupid_.

Because Gabriel was never his. Not even in the golden age of their prime. He belonged to someone else – where he had a family and a life. And Jack. Jack gave that all up. Left his feelings unvoiced; a silent seed growing in his heart he constantly stamped down in the hopes that it would wither away in time. But they hadn’t, and instead, the seed had grown and it was too late for Jack to weed it out.

He had Gabriel here and not _here_.

He was _afraid_ of Gabriel leaving.

He _knew_ Gabriel would leave.

He shouldn’t have left the alley.

 

When Gabriel returned an hour later, Jack was fast asleep – features hidden beneath a blinking cat. Even through the darkness of the room, the former mercenary could see pale fingers buried deep into the fur, the strained pulse of the soldier beating in a neck.

He let himself under the covers and placed an arm over Jack. Hoping that his presence would chase away the soldier’s fear.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Formatting on Ao3 hurts.


End file.
